


Traveling Riverside Blues

by baby_novak_winchester_67



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-31
Updated: 2016-08-31
Packaged: 2018-08-12 07:17:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7925584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baby_novak_winchester_67/pseuds/baby_novak_winchester_67
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The life of Dean and Reader on the road. The hunting isn't mentioned in this but it is not crucial to the story. however if you don't know the main plot of the tv show you may be confused as to why they live the way they do. also a happy life for Sammy. Yaay!<br/>Warning: in my opinion there are major feels in this story. I cried writing it and still cry everytime I read it... still it's a lot of fluff. I liked writing it. I hope it's not too bad. this is my first time ever posting a story of mine online so I'm a little nervous...! <br/>reviews and comments are appreciated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Traveling Riverside Blues

 

 

 

       I sink back in to the soft pillow with a sigh. I close my eyes and focus on the smells around me. It smells just like any other crappy, cheap motel room. The scent of industrial cleaner probably bought at Costco in the convenient galleon size does little to cover up the lingering smell of mildew and dirt. I can also perceive the scent of our last takeout dinner in the air. Greasy hamburgers and even greasier french fries _. The sweet smell of my future clogged arteries,_ I think cynically. But that’s life on the road with Dean. I knew what I was signing up for when I’d agreed to go with him. This had been his life ever since he was a kid, when he’d been on the road constantly with his father and younger brother. And now with his dad passed away and Sam at Stanford, he did it alone. Until he met me that is. Now we travel all over the country, driving everywhere since we both have an irrationally huge fear of planes and of flying in general. We live in stinky motel rooms, eat cheap, soggy takeout and do odd jobs whenever and wherever we can find them. At night we hustle pool in bars, and drink local brand beer and cheap whiskey that burns our throats more than it should. Dean is also an exceptional poker player, even though he doesn’t always play fair. Well, actually he never plays fair but we need to pay for our cheap alcohol, crappy motel rooms, unhealthy meals, and gas somehow.

I keep my eyes closed but turn my head when I hear the rumble of the car outside. It’s a black 1967 Chevy Impala and it is more of a home to me and Dean than any of the motel rooms we’ve ever stayed in. There are more memories made in that car for us, than anywhere else. Like driving on some deserted stretch of highway somewhere with the windows down singing along loudly to Steppenwolf’s _Born to be Wild_ , or Warrant's _Cherry Pie,_ or Def Leppard's  _Rock of Ages._ We both love classic rock and Dean keeps a collection of cassette tapes that’s older than the both of us combined in the foot space of the passenger seat. There’s nothing better than flying along the highway at twice the legal speed limit, windows open, wind in our hair, hands intertwined over the gear shift, AC/DC’s _Highway to Hell_ blaring and singing along, our out-of-tune voices still somehow forming a beautiful duet. To us it’s the sound of being free, of being happy, the sound of being together and of being in love.

Often, when we’re between locations we park the car on some deserted forest road and sleep. Dean, ever the gentleman always lets me stretch out on the backseat while he scrunches his 6-foot-something body up in the driver’s seat somehow. We also take turns driving while the other one naps in the passenger seat; Soft Rock playing quietly on the radio to lull one to sleep and keep the other awake. Often the head of the sleeper will wind up in the driver’s lap with them softly stroking the other’s hair. Many a night we sit on the hood of the car, out in the middle of nowhere and gaze up at the star strewn sky watching for shooting stars. Dean’s arm would be wrapped around me, my head resting on his chest. Whenever he talked or hummed contently in his deep voice I would feel it vibrating in his chest and the feeling has always been immensely comforting to me. It’s a sensation of being at home.

I hear the jangle of keys outside the door and a distinct tinkling as the person out there drops them. There’s a mumbled “Sonofabitch” muffled by the door, and then the rustle of fabric as the man outside bends to retrieve them. I grin, eyes still shut picturing Dean’s scowl. Finally there is the scrape of the key in the lock and then the grating squeak of the rusty hinges as the door swings open. I notice his scent first, as unique to him as one snowflake is to another. It is the smell of leather and whiskey and a special sharp and spicy musk that is just _Dean_. It’s the smell of home to me.

Suddenly something hits me hard in the stomach, knocking the wind out of me. 

“There you go bitch,” Dean says gruffly. I pick up the bag of my clean clothes he had lobbed at me and drop it to the floor beside me. Dean hates going to the laundromat so often. If it were up to him he would wear the same clothes everyday and not wash them for a month. Unfortunately for him, or fortunately depending on how you look at it,  I insist on a tad more personal hygiene so now he has to go in search of a laundromat at least once a week. 

I open my eyes and watch him throw his own sack of clean clothes into his duffle bag, then head to the fridge, rummage around inside it for a while and finally emerge with a beer in each hand. He’s wearing the scowl that I know so well and that I’d imagined on his face when he dropped his keys outside. I hear the soft hiss of the lids being popped off of two bottles and watch him toss both lids into the trash can halfway across the room. 

“Thanks jerk!” I say fondly referring to both the clean clothes and the bottle of beer he’s just passed me. I observe the small reluctant smile that crosses his face replacing the scowl. No matter how much time passes, no matter how close the two of us are and no matter the walls we’d broken down together, Dean is still reluctant to let anyone see his soft side. I still see it more than anyone else but it’s rare for Dean to truly bare his heart and soul, even to me. 

Luckily I have a few tricks up my sleeve. I lean over and press play on my iPod. It’s set to the playlist that I had made specially for nights like these. Soft songs, slow songs; the gentle crooning of Sinatra’s _Summer_ _Wind_ or Elvis’s _Can’t Help Falling in Love_. I watch Dean’s head sweep up from where he had been staring into the depths of his beer bottle. His eyes find mine and I see them become tender. He puts his bottle down and walks over until he’s hovering over me. He extends his hand and says in a soft, raspy voice

"May I have this dance?" 

Smiling I place my own small, pale, hand in his large, rough and callused one. He pulls me to my feet and against his chest as his arms wrap around me, holding me tightly and swaying gently to the music. I lay my head against his chest, in that one spot that I’d claimed as mine. He’s humming in time with the song: Stevie Wonder’s As. Then he starts to sing along,

_ “As around the sun the earth knows she’s revolving  _

_ And the rosebuds know to bloom in early May  _

_ Just as hate knows love’s the cure  _

_ You can rest your mind assure  _

_ That I’ll be loving you always”  _

His deep, gravelly, baritone voice vibrates in his chest against my ear. Home! I close my eyes again and press my lips to the spot where his heart beats underneath the flannel shirt he’s wearing. 

The words “I love you” are very rarely spoken by either of us. There isn’t a need for it; not when we have these moments. I trust him completely, love him entirely, and would do anything for him. Time and again my actions and his have proven this beyond a doubt. We are soulmates connected on some level above simple love. We can read each other’s minds and feelings. We know each other better than anyone else has ever known us, and we understand without having to articulate it, that saying that the words “I love you” is almost too mundane and bland to describe what we have and what we feel for each other. We were simply made to be together. Two separate pieces that are only whole when we are with the other. 

Taking a deep breath I pull back to look up at him. His clear, remarkably green eyes are sparkling with joy and in that moment I become aware once again why I put up with it all; the smelly motels, the endless hours spent in the car, the less-than-honourable ways we make our living, and Dean’s often sourly attitude. It’s for all the reasons I had thought about earlier. All the good times the two of us have, that far outweigh the bad times. It’s because we are free and I am together with the one person on the planet who was meant to be with me. And even though I don’t have a beautiful house in a beautiful neighbourhood, with a beautiful white picket fence and a beautiful yard, like I’d dreamed of as a child, I have something better. I have a home. And it isn’t this stinky motel, with the noisy fridge, the disgusting bathroom, and the bedsheets that are stained with god-knows-what and human juices. It isn’t even the Impala. My home is with Dean and will always be with him. 

I close my eyes again and snuggle back into his embrace. He leans down and places a soft kiss to the top of my head. And I revel in the knowledge that we are together.  Now and forever! 

“Grandma? Grandma!” 

I turn slowly, heart beating rapidly as I look down at a small face. I turn back towards Dean and find the space before me empty , my hands holding on to air. 

“Grandma, dinner’s ready.” 

The small boy with the familiar green eyes turns with an equally familiar scowl and leaves me alone, not in a motel room, but in a bedroom, that smells of fabric softener, lavender perfume and of a bouquet of wildflowers that sits on the dresser. There is no hint of the smell of industrial cleaner, mildew and dirt, and leather and whiskey  that had been so strong in my nose just moments before. How long have I been lost this time? 

I shuffle over to the dresser, moving slowly on feet that had moments before floated across the room in graceful dance steps, but now ache with arthritis and gout. I watch as a small wrinkled hand with skin far too loose reaches for the picture frame that stands in front of the vase full of flowers. My hand, I remind myself. 

With a sigh my fingers trace over the glass covering the old polaroid picture. Sam had taken it one day when we went to visit him at Stanford. The three of us plus Sam’s girlfriend Jess had gone somewhere to spend the day. The photo shows Dean and I leaning against the side of the Impala. His strong arm wrapped around me, squeezing me tightly and holding me to his side. His dirty blond hair rumpled and a little too long and the laugh lines around his green eyes prominent. We were both laughing, and happiness and love seems to radiate from the photograph. Some long forgotten joke in some place I’ll never remember and never return to again. 

And he was so young. I didn’t think that at the time. Both of us had lived through so much, but we were both living in the moment, never thinking about the past, not worrying about the future. We’d just lived in the now, basking in our freedom and togetherness. We had enjoyed being young. Eternally young we had called ourselves. But I have grown old. And Dean… he will always be that age to me, always be that full of life and fire, bravery, and jokes. Because he’d never gotten the chance to get any older. 

A lone tear drops from my eye right onto the spot on Deans chest that I’d once loved to rest my head against. I wipe it away and kiss the frame. 

“I’ll see you soon!” I whisper placing the picture carefully back in its spot.

**Author's Note:**

> To quote Crowley: "FEELINGS!!!"  
> The idea for this story came from another writer. Unfortunatly I don't remember who. So if anyone recognizes it please tell me so I can give credit for the idea. I did write the story myself and added a lot more plot and backstory but the idea came from someone else. i hope it was ok...?!


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